EX294 Practice Test 5 — 10 Questions

Question 1

An Ansible rolling update playbook has 'serial: 1' and 'max_fail_percentage: 0'. During the update of a 5-host group, the first host fails. What is the outcome?

Accepted Answer

The play aborts immediately. With 'serial: 1', Ansible updates one host at a time. 'max_fail_percentage: 0' means that if any host fails (0% failure tolerance), the entire playbook run is aborted immediately. When the first host fails, Ansible stops further execution because the failure percentage exceeds the threshold, and no retries or continuation occur.

Answer

The play pauses for manual intervention

Answer

The play retries the failed host

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The play continues with the remaining 4 hosts

Answer

The play marks the host as unreachable and continues

Question 2

A team uses Ansible to update a web application across 10 servers with minimal downtime. Which playbook directive achieves one-at-a-time updates?

Accepted Answer

serial: 1. C is correct because the `serial: 1` directive in an Ansible playbook controls the number of hosts that are updated simultaneously. Setting `serial: 1` forces Ansible to execute the playbook on one host at a time, ensuring that the web application is updated sequentially across the 10 servers, which minimizes downtime by keeping the other 9 servers available during each individual update.

Answer

run_once: true

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delegate_to: localhost

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throttle: 1

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forks: 10

Question 3

An organization wants to deploy Ansible Automation Platform 2.x in a highly available configuration. Which component must be deployed in an active-active cluster to ensure controller failover?

Accepted Answer

Automation controller. The automation controller is the component that provides the web UI, REST API, and job execution management in Ansible Automation Platform 2.x. For high availability, multiple controller nodes must be deployed in an active-active cluster behind a load balancer, ensuring that if one controller fails, another can immediately take over without service interruption.

Answer

PostgreSQL database

Answer

Private Automation Hub

Answer

Automation mesh

Question 4

Which TWO statements are true regarding the deployment of Ansible Automation Platform in a highly available configuration?

Accepted Answer

The automation controller requires a PostgreSQL database that must be configured with replication for high availability.. Option C is correct because in a highly available Ansible Automation Platform deployment, the automation controller (the control plane) relies on an external PostgreSQL database, and HA is achieved by configuring that PostgreSQL instance with replication (e.g., streaming replication or a supported HA topology) so the controller can fail over without losing job data. Option E is correct because the automation mesh (based on receptor) is the component that provides resilient, fault-tolerant execution by routing jobs across hop nodes and execution nodes, allowing execution to continue even if individual nodes become unavailable. Option A is incorrect because automation hub's PostgreSQL database is not strictly required to be external for HA in the way described; hub can be deployed with its own supported database configuration, and the statement overstates the requirement. Option B is incorrect because execution nodes do not need direct network access to the automation controller's database; they communicate with the controller through the mesh/receptor network, not by connecting to PostgreSQL directly. Option D is incorrect because SQLite is not supported for production automation controller deployments; PostgreSQL is required.

Answer

The automation hub requires an external PostgreSQL database to store collections and execution environments.

Answer

Execution nodes must have direct network access to the automation controller database.

Answer

The automation controller can use an embedded SQLite database for production deployments.

Question 5

An Ansible administrator wants to use an encrypted vault file to store sensitive variables. Which command creates a new vault file and prompts for a password?

Accepted Answer

ansible-vault create secrets.yml. `ansible-vault create secrets.yml` creates a new encrypted vault file and immediately prompts the user to set a password, which is then used to encrypt the file. This command is specifically designed for initial creation of vault files, unlike `edit` which requires an existing file, `view` which only displays content, or `encrypt` which encrypts an existing plaintext file.

Answer

ansible-vault edit secrets.yml

Answer

ansible-vault view secrets.yml

Answer

ansible-vault encrypt secrets.yml

Question 6

Which command publishes a collection to Automation Hub?

Accepted Answer

ansible-galaxy collection publish ./namespace-name-1.0.0.tar.gz --token MYTOKEN. `ansible-galaxy collection publish` is the specific command used to upload a collection tarball to Automation Hub (or any Galaxy server). The `--token` flag provides the required API authentication token for the publish operation. This command sends the tarball to the server's API endpoint, which validates and imports the collection.

Answer

ansible-galaxy collection import ./namespace-name-1.0.0.tar.gz

Answer

ansible-galaxy collection upload ./namespace-name-1.0.0.tar.gz

Answer

ansible-galaxy collection push ./namespace-name-1.0.0.tar.gz

Question 7

A playbook uses serial: 2 and sets any_errors_fatal: true. The first batch of 2 hosts both fail. What happens?

Accepted Answer

The playbook aborts and no further batches run.. When `any_errors_fatal: true` is set and a batch of hosts fails, Ansible immediately aborts the entire playbook run for all remaining hosts, regardless of the `serial` setting. Since the first batch of 2 hosts both fail, no further batches are executed. This behavior is designed to prevent cascading failures in critical deployments.

Answer

The playbook continues with the next batch.

Answer

The playbook marks the batch as unreachable and continues.

Answer

The playbook retries the failed hosts.

Question 8

A role contains a handler. The playbook includes the role and also defines a task that notifies the same handler. When the playbook runs, the handler executes only once. Which of the following best explains this behavior?

Accepted Answer

handlers are deduplicated by name; multiple notifications trigger the handler only once per play. Ansible handlers are deduplicated by name within a play. When a handler is notified multiple times—whether from a role or a playbook task—it runs only once at the end of the play, after all tasks have completed. This prevents redundant executions and is a core design feature of Ansible's handler system.

Answer

the handler was already triggered by the role and is skipped for the play task

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the role's handler uses 'listen' which overrides notifications

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the playbook's task notifies a different handler with the same name

Question 9

An admin is configuring a project in Automation Platform to pull playbooks from a Git repository. Which source control type should be selected?

Accepted Answer

SCM. (SCM) is correct because Ansible Automation Platform uses Source Control Management (SCM) to integrate with Git repositories. When configuring a project, selecting 'SCM' allows the platform to pull playbooks, roles, and inventories directly from a remote Git repository, enabling version control and automated sync.

Answer

Local

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Manual

Answer

Red Hat Insights

Question 10

A team wants to use a certified collection from Red Hat Automation Hub but cannot access it directly due to firewall restrictions. What is the best practice?

Accepted Answer

Set up a private Automation Hub and sync the collection.. Setting up a private Automation Hub and syncing the certified collection is the best practice for environments with firewall restrictions. This approach ensures that the collection remains in a trusted, curated state, is automatically updated, and can be consumed by all team members via `ansible-galaxy` without manual intervention, maintaining compliance with Red Hat's support policies.

Answer

Download the collection manually and install from a tarball.

Answer

Copy the collection from another team's workspace.

Answer

Use ansible-galaxy collection install with --offline flag.